Forward Unto Atlantis
by LucyFearsTheMorningStar
Summary: On the way back to Atlantis, the USS Daedalus stumbles upon a wrecked Frigate floating in the void of space between the Pegasus Galaxy and the Milky Way. Will a weary expedition find unexpected salvation? Or will they add to the monument of Ancient sins?
1. Reboot

Hey guys, i decided to write a crossover for halo and sga, as i saw that there were no decent/current stories around the net that i could find. The only note that i want to add is that the events of this story take place just after the Last Stargate SG-1 episode, unending, which culminated in the collective suicide of the Asgard, and the inheritance the Tau'ri recieved from the little grey guys, effectively making them "the fifth race" so to speak.

So bear in mind that the timeframe is well before the finale of Atlantis, and the Daedalus has not yet recieved its refits, namely the Asgard system upgrades, (improved sensors, shields, beam transporters, hyperdrive, plasma beam arrays, ect)

As you can probably guess, i was NOT pleased in the least by the ending of the series, so i decided to come up with this a few years back, however this is the first time I've had to put the ideas in my head out into a physical printed format.

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_**Act One  
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_**.//Reboot  
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**USS Daedalus, en-route to Pegasus Galaxy - **'If these trips between earth and Atlantis are one thing, its uneventful,' thought Colonel Steven Caldwell. After being relieved by Colonel Sheppard, he was tucking into a rather large hoagie. It had been 3 days into the trip, and due to the fact that they were using the power of an ancient ZPM the Atlantis team had found earlier, the journey was significantly faster. If all went well, they should be entering the Pegasus galaxy in a little under a day. Just as he had taken his fourth bite into the delicious sandwich, he heard the last thing he wanted to hear over the ship's intercom system. "Colonel Caldwell, you need to see this, the scanners are picking up a weak distress beacon. We need you on the bridge sir." The voice of his communication officer was the last thing he wanted to hear at the moment, but nonetheless he pressed the small button on his standard issue communication earpiece, and replied; "Understood, I'm on my way."

As Caldwell entered the bridge, he looked around and saw that the members of John's team were already present. Ronan looking moody as usual, Tayla with a rather puzzled expression on her face, John with a nonchalant expression, and Rodney conversing excitedly with the communications officer. Noticing the ship's commander, John waved him over to the communication's console. "Take a look at this. I think we have a weak distress signal coming from a few hundred light years ahead of us," said John, with a look of excited interest on his face. Caldwell on the other hand was not as lax as Sheppard, and had a bit of a bad feeling about this signal. They were a few thousand light years from the very most edge of the Pegasus galaxy. Nothing should be out here except for, well, nothing.

Always preferring to err on the side of caution, he spoke to his navigator; "Drop us out of hyperspace at the very edge of our long range scanners, and prep the F-302 squadrons for scramble on the off chance of this being a wraith trap." "Aww, c'mon Caldwell. The Wraith don't lay elaborate traps like this. It isn't their style. They either jump you, or blast you with overwhelming numbers and firepower," drawled Sheppard. Secretly agreeing with the Atlantis team leader, but not enough to shake the bad feeling he had, he said nothing. "Sir, dropping out of hyperspace in three, two, one, mark. We have now reverted to real space."

"Activate long range scanners, and bring it onscreen," barked the Colonel. "Onscreen," said the communications officer. As the results of the scan was brought onscreen, the mood in the bridge tensed up considerably. The feed from the sensors was the last thing they expected to see. Instead of a lost trade ship, a abandoned beacon, or a wraith trap, they were greeted with the sight of the aft section of a wrecked warship, seemingly sheared in half by a horrendously powerful amount of energy. Feeling rather nervous, Caldwell wanted to see if there were any records in the SGC database that matched this wreck of a warship anywhere. He looked at McKay and was about to tell him to crosscheck the sensor data with the database, but before he opened his mouth, "Colonel, this doesn't match any type of ship operated by any known galactic faction we have come across before!" exclaimed the excited Canadian. The bad feeling Caldwell had was getting worse by the minute. "Rodney, bring the transmission onscreen," said John. "yes yes, I'm already on it. The coding is different, I just have to finish running it through a nifty little translation program I wrote myself, and, ah, done." With a smug little flourish, the scientist put the transmission on the main screen.

A tremor of surprise shook the bridge as the results were displayed. In a light blue hue was the symbol of a Phoenix rising up above what was unmistakably a depiction of earth. Underneath the symbol were the words UNSC Frigate Forward Unto Dawn. "Scan the wreck for survivors, I want to make sure that nobody is still trapped aboard that ship!" Exclaimed Caldwell. Seconds later, the communications officer blurted; "Sir! I am reading one life sign aboard, but its very weak. It seems to be consistent with cryogenic sleep!" "John, prep your team, we are going to beam you aboard. I want you to check it out, and see check out that life sign." said Caldwell. "Got it," replied Sheppard. "Tayla, Ronan, be ready in five. Same for you Rodney. Meet up in the armory for equipment, and make sure you have a EVA suit. Who knows if there is pressure on that hulk or not."

**Cryostasis, UNSC Forward Unto Dawn - **The A.I. Cortana flashed into existence on a holopad next to the only functioning cryobed in the remains of the frigate. Quickly she did a self diagnostic, and then checked the reserve power output of the auxiliary reactor. Satisfied that the reactor was functioning, she gazed upon the sleeping Spartan. She was debating waking him up after learning the results of her self diagnostic. The battle with Gravemind had taken its toll, as well as absorbing all the data from the first Forerunner Ringworld. "Wake me, when you need me," the Chief had told her, right before he climbed into the cryobed. She considered waking the Chief to tell him how she felt. A smart A.I. had a lifespan of about seven years, before they quite literally "thought themselves to death" how ironic, she reflected. Through everything she had faced with the Chief, her battles with Gravemind, the hordes of Covenant, and two harrowing escapes from exploding Forerunner artifacts, she was going to die from thinking. She wanted more than anything to let him know that she loved him. But every time she was poised to do it, here ethics subroutine overrode that course of action. Besides, she was an Artificial Intelligence, not a human. How was the Chief supposed to react? Resigning herself to the fact that she would most likely never go through with it, she quickly created a program to wake her in another month, to check on the status of the frozen super-soldier she cared so deeply for. Just as she was about to shut down, she noticed something.

It seemed that the Dawn was being scanned by something. Accessing what was left of the network of the crippled Frigate, she re-routed as much power as she dared to the passive sensors, making sure to keep an ample supply for herself and the Master Chief. As the passive sensors relayed the data to her, she decided to begin to thaw out the Chief. She overrode the programmed sleep cycle, and began an emergency quick thaw of the cryostasis. With a pop and a hiss, the lid of the cryobed opened..

_John was running through the field. He was a boy still, and was filled with unexplainable elation. Suddenly he was back on his home planet, the name a distant memory. He was playing with the others, pushing them off of his hill. As the other children attempted to claim his throne, he stood tall, slightly stronger, smarter, faster and tougher then them all. Suddenly he heard his name called, and a man and woman were approaching him. "John is in trouble!" his friends chanted, and ran off. The woman, a pretty lady with glasses and a sharp look in her eyes kneeled down to John. She wanted to test him it seemed. All he had to do was guess what side a flipped coin would land on. He always had luck.._

_Suddenly he was back on Reach. He was focused, and he had a mission to complete. He had to bring all his comrades home with him, he wouldn't leave any behind. He and a few others scouted the position ahead of them, and saw a few marines guarding a Pelican dropship. He quickly assessed the size of the force guarding the transport and then mentally compiled a list of equipment he and his force had. Not much, as usual. Mendez always had a twist to his tests. He looked to the ground, and found a fist sized rock. He began to form an idea.._

_Racing forward, his mind flashed to the day he first met Cortana. She reminded him of Doctor Halsey. He was fitting his MJOLNIR armor for the first time, and was testing it. Doctor Halsey instructed him to insert the A.I. into the neural slot on the helmet, and was shocked at the sensation of another consciousness in his mind. During the test, the spunky A.I. showed her wit and intelligence, as well as her invaluable ability to save John's life. After all, there were two of them in here.._

_More quickly Johns dreaming mind went through his memories, picking out significant parts and highlighting them, the escape from Reach, the first contact with the Flood, the retrieval of Captain Keyes' neural unit, the escape from the Pillar of Autumn and the first ring, Sergeant Johnson, Miranda Keyes, the second Halo, Gravemind, meeting the Arbiter for the first time along with Gravemind, High Charity, the shame, guilt, and loss he felt when leaving Cortana behind.._

_Finally slowing, his subconscious slowly cycled through his time spent on the Ark, his partnership with the Arbiter, The death of Johnson and Miranda, the happiness he felt when he finally rescued Cortana from the clutches of the flood.._

_Cortana…_

Suddenly he awoke, feeling the rough chafing feeling on his skin. The MJOLNIR armor system was designed for extreme periods of extended wear, but not in cryostasis, as such his skin was slightly raw and irritated. The Master Chief slowly rose up out of the Cryobed, and was faced with a worried looking Cortana. "Miss me already?" John teased her, causing a slight ripple in the codes flowing along her supple body, along with a momentary change in her light blue color to a slightly pinkish tinge. Ignoring the Chief's quip, the A.I. quickly stated the situation to the Spartan. "Sorry for interrupting your beauty sleep, but we have a unknown ship inbound. The vessel doesn't match any of the record in the Dawn's database, nor any of the files I downloaded when I hacked the ONI server." Without so much as a pause, the Chief got up, and started walking. "Where are you going?" asked Cortana. Without so much as a backward glance, the Spartan said in his dead, emotionless, combat voice, "To get a weapon."

**Auxiliary reactor room, UNSC Forward Unto Dawn - **A faint slithering sound was heard, and something was stirring in the darkness. A smell of rotten flesh permeated the air, and a faint wet slapping sound was heard, like a pair of rotted steaks being tossed on top of one another. A low rumbling growl was unleashed as the reactor room emergency lighting came online. Whatever was on the battered frigate, it didn't want to be seen for the moment.

**Armory of USS Daedalus, orbiting UNSC Forward Unto Dawn - **John was helping Tayla and Ronan climb into the cumbersome EVA suits. The former Runner and Tribeswoman were having trouble with the bulky suit, and they weren't too happy to be restricted to them. "I hate these things," grumbled a disgruntled Ronan. "If the Wraith decide to ambush us, we will be sitting ducks. You can hardly even walk in these things." The danger of a possible Wraith ambush lost upon the Canadian, McKay was rambling on about the possible salvageable technologies onboard the derelict vessel. He had done a rudimentary analysis of the sheared section of the Forward Unto Dawn, and found that not only was the alloy incredibly strong, even stronger than the naquadah composite alloy that served as the armor for the 304 Deepspace Carriers. So as he pointed out on the bridge, the ship was actually tougher than the Daedalus, which elicited some rather shocked looks from the crew. Based on his initial findings, the amount of energy required to simply shear this ship in half must have been astronomical. Already in his EVA suit, Rodney picked up his ever present tablet computer, and double checked his calculations. Sheppard, finally managing to get the other two in their pressurized attire, picked up his P90 and some spare ammunition, just in case. Tayla also took a P90, as well as a Wraith stun pistol. Ronan was armed with his trademark blaster, and Rodney had his 9MM Glock, inside of his suit.

"Rodney, why is your gun inside your suit?" asked a thoroughly irritated Sheppard. "What good is it going to do you if you have to fight in a no pressure environment?!" a irritated Doctor McKay glared at the colonel and snapped "About as much good as yours is going to do you Sheppard. For you information, if it comes down to a fight in a no pressure environment, which I seriously doubt will happen, our weapons may as well be rocks. There is no oxygen in space, nor in zero pressure for that matter. Therefore the combustion reaction required to propel the bullet cannot take place. So in actuality, you are no better than me in this situation." Sheppard, thoroughly annoyed with being scolded by the scientist, unconsciously pulled his weapon closer to his chest and replied; "well, I think ill take it, just in case." Rolling her eyes, Tayla activated her earpiece and said "Tayla to Caldwell, we are ready for transport. Beam us over when you ready." The team's earpieces crackled to life and Caldwell's voice said "I hear you Tayla, prep for insertion in five. Good luck to you, we will be standing by to beam you out at a moments notice. Caldwell out." Ronan mentally steeled himself when he heard that. Despite all the times he had been beamed in and out of the ship, it was still an unsettling experience for him. Closing his eyes, he heard the activation of the Asgard technology, and the unsettling feeling of his body being disassembled to the last atom, then instantly reassembled. When he finally realized he was whole, the tall, dreadlock sporting man opened his eyes, and was greeted with a shocking view.

**Armory of UNSC Frigate Forward Unto Dawn - **The Master Chief looked around the expansive room he now stood in. technically it was a small armory by the standards of the UNSC, but as standards go, the UNSC was not exactly typical. Where he stood now was more of a gymnasium than a room. The Armory was huge, with rows of weapons, crates of ammunition, and strings of belts attached with grenades. Looking around, the he picked up his weapon of choice, the weapon that had seen him through hordes of covenant and swarms of flood, through two ring worlds, the Ark, his second run through High Charity, and countless other situations, the MA5C. The sturdy assault rifle was a good choice in almost any situation, with a near perfect balance of range, accuracy, clip size and stopping power. It was the Chief's personal opinion that he would not be alive today had it not been for this weapon.

Setting the gun aside for the moment, he walked over and picked up a strange looking object, that seemed to be nothing more that a handle. The opposite sides were emitting a faint glow, but it was something that would be easily looked over had someone not know what it was. He picked up the object, and squeezed the handle. With a hiss and a flash of bluish green light, a crackling twin pronged sword appeared, seemingly made of energized plasma. Giving it another slight squeeze, the blade disappeared. With a satisfying clink of metal on metal, the John placed the Type 1 Energy Weapon on his left magnetized thigh plate, and moved on to the sidearm section of the armory. Looking around, he saw something that significantly brightened his mood. Walking over he picked up a M6D Magnum. This weapon was a pistol, but it had a significant punch to it. The relatively oversized pistol could kill an elite from roughly a hundred meters with a few well placed shots, and devastated unshielded infantry due to the semi-armor piercing explosive rounds it fired. If that want enough, the scope feature that liked with his HUD in his suit only added to the deadliness of the weapon. Not many had survived the war, and by the time he had returned to Earth from the first Halo, the pistol was a rarity indeed.

Placing the pistol on his right magnetized thigh plate, the Spartan spotted something that caused his gut to wrench. Leaning up against the wall, next to a few recharge packs, was a Model 6 Grindell/Galilean Non-Linear Rifle, dubbed the Spartan Laser by the Marines of the UNSC. Few marines were strong enough to lug the heavy weapon around, and fewer still were able to use it for extended periods due to its massive size. But it wasn't the fact that it was just a weapon that caused the Spartan to react, it was the man who gave it to him. The man who, to his death, fought to protect humanity, and was one of the few non-Spartans John deemed an equal and worthy of his respect. As he picked it up and placed the weapon on his magnetized back plate, his memory flashed back to the last moments of Sergeant Avery Johnson.

_The Master Chief and the Arbiter were just outside of the Control room of the partially completed Halo, the sword of the long dead Forerunners. They were standing back to back, the Chief wielding a battle rifle and the Arbiter his energy sword. The Chief fired a three round burst, the high velocity rifle rounds tearing through the chest of the Flood combat form. Whirling, he noticed a pair of Infected Jiralhanae storming towards him, their ferocity and strength only amplified by the Flood infection forms controlling their corpses like morbid puppeteers. One of the charging juggernauts was wielding a Type 2 Energy weapon, otherwise known as a Gravity Hammer. Firing 6 rounds into the chests of both forms, the Spartan dropped the charging pair, black infected blood and clear oozing ichor pouring from both bodies. Silently thanking Doctor Halsey for the millionth time for installing filters in the suits system, as well as a temporary pressurized air supply, he picked up the giant weapon, using its powerful strikes to decimate the legions of Flood hell-bent on assimilating him and his Sangheili comrade. As he swung the fearsome weapon, the flood beneath its head splattered in a morbid shower of blood, guts, ichor, and gas, as the host body was utterly decimated and the infection form controlling it popped with a sickening sound._

"_Wort, Wort, Wort!!" startled by the traditional Sangheili battle call, the Chief looked over his shoulder to see his friend being overwhelmed by combat forms. The Elite's shields were down, and rivulets of purplish blood rand down from several bullet wounds inflicted from the SMG firing combat forms. Quickly acting, John detached a Bubble Shield from his belt and threw it at the Arbiter, its golden-tinged field providing a temporary respite for the besieged warrior. Without skipping a beat, the genetically enhanced super-soldier threw a fragmentation grenade at the infected humans spraying a wall of lead at the alien. The throw was perfect, the grenade hit the ground and bounced up, the delay fuse activating when it hit the ground and detonating at chest height, shredding the defiled bodies of once proud UNSC Marines. The Arbiter engaged his second plasma blade, and charged the mass of infected Flood, slicing through the abominations like they were nothing more than paper, a sickening hiss as each strike sliced off limbs, cut bodies in half and decapitated scores of the creatures. Finally, the Monitor, 343 Guilty Spark, managed to get the doors open. As the pair retreated into the opening, they were faced by a pair of infected Lek'golo. Just as the two warriors were beginning to feel the fear of death, a blood red beam lanced down from a cliff a few hundred meters behind their position. The beam, utterly destroyed the infected Lek'golo, smoldering pieces of flesh and fragments of armor were all that remained of the giants. Suddenly the comm crackled to life "Go you two, get to the control room! I've got you covered." Silently thanking the cigar loving Sergeant for the timely support, the Chief and the Arbiter charged into the control room. Running up to the holographic control panel, the Chief touched a glowing panel, and felt the presence of Cortana leave his mind._

_Just as Cortana was about to activate the ring for a remote firing sequence, 343 Guilty Spark turned on the chief, the A.I. running rampant, immobilizing the Arbiter and firing on the Chief. Just as his shields finally failed, another crimson lance of energy struck the floating orb. "How dare you?!" screeched the monitor, "As a Reclaimer it is your duty to preserve the integrity of this installation! Activating it will result in its destruction!" Johnson, looking unimpressed, fired another blast of the powerful weapon, replying "You know, you talk too much for a light bulb." Just as the Spartan's shields were fully recharged, Guilty Spark unleashed a torrent of energy into the seemingly indestructible marine. Rushing to his side, the Sergeant handed him the powerful weapon, and with his last words, ordered him to protect Cortana. With anger coursing through his veins at the death of his friend, the 7 foot tall armored powerhouse hefted the Spartan Laser, aimed at the Monitor and unleashed a torrent of energy, avenging the death of his comrade._

Shaking himself of his reverie, the Spartan then gathered clips for his Magnum and his assault rifle, and an ample supply of recharging power packs for his Spartan Laser. Satisfied with the amount of ammo he had gathered, he put the clips and packs into his pop out ammo holsters near his magnetic thigh plates, and proceeded to gather grenades. As he attached two fragmentation grenades, a pair of spike grenades, a couple of plasma grenades, as well as some incendiary grenades for good measure, he walked back to where he set aside his MA5C, picked it up, and walked back to the Cryobay where Cortana was waiting for him, an impatient expression on her exotic face.

"Your not assaulting High Charity you know, don't you think your going a bit overboard?" asked the A.I. with one eyebrow raised, noting all the firepower the Spartan had equipped himself with. Pretending not to hear her query, John asked; "So what's the situation?" Looking like she was trying to hold back a smile, Cortana replied "The Dawn's sensors have determined that the unknown vessel is orbiting us, and I recently picked up a strange energy fluctuation from the vehicle bay. After the anomaly had dispersed, I picked up four life signs, though the Dawns sensors are too damaged in that region to determine the species. I have no idea what they are, human, covenant, or flood. There is simply no way to tell. I have activated emergency lighting throughout the ship, and pressurized the sections where the hull integrity is not compromised." Acknowledging the her with a slight nod, the Spartan asked "Is that all?" Looking irritated, the A.I. snapped, "Yes, seeing as I don't have a physical body, I cant exactly repair the ship's systems myself." Ignoring the outburst, the Spartan reached down and removed the tiny chip that housed his A.I. companion from the holopad. Carefully he inserted the chip into his neural interface, and the familiar feeling of ice cold mercury flooding his brain returned, indicating the return of Cortana to his mind. 'I'm picking up patchy transmissions from the unknown vessel orbiting us and the team in the vehicle bay, however they are too garbled to make heads or tails of.' 'Understood' John though, knowing that Cortana could hear him. With that thought, he proceeded to make his way to the vehicle bay, traveling surprisingly stealthily despite being clad in such heavy armor.

**UNSC Forward Unto Dawn, Aft Vehicle Bay - **Sheppard looked up in awe and amazement at the sight he now beheld. Blinking multiple times to be sure that what he was seeing was correct, his jaw dropped slightly as he understood where he was. Looking around, he noted he was in the bottom level of a cavernous Vehicle bay. It was roughly half a kilometer long, a quarter of a kilometer wide and had six levels two it, and from what he could see, was relatively full still. On the bottom level, to his left were rows of mean looking scout vehicles, with four wheels, wicked looking suspensions, and either vicious looking cannon-like turrets on the back or a gigantic chain gun. Looking to his right, he saw rows upon rows of huge tanks, most with plasma scars, but impressive nonetheless. Silently wondering who these mysterious people were fighting, and why just one ship sported almost an entire battalion of armor on just one level, the battle hardened colonel, and felt a pang of unease at the sight. The two levels above the bottom deck were filled with mean looking ships, which he assumed were dropships or transports by their size. The levels above that was filled with various aircraft, small and large VTOL units, huge ships that john guessed were fighters, and what looked like huge, flying tanks.

Finally managing to take his eyes off the sight, Sheppard looked around at his team, judging by the expressions on their faces that they were equally shocked. Even McKay was at a loss for words, something that rarely happened with the narcissistic scientist. Suddenly John began to get a very bad feeling about this wreck. Ronan suddenly spoke up, voicing and validating his own fears; "Whoever had the resources to field an operation like this, and needed this much firepower to combat their enemy, shouldn't have left their ship abandoned like this. They would have been more than capable of mounting a salvage and rescue operation. And where is the rest of the crew?! I don't like this much. I say we go, find out whatever it is that may be alive on this ship, find out what happened, and get the hell off." McKay however, was not satisfied with simply leaving that quickly. Excitedly he spoke up in his aggravatingly commanding tone, "We can't just leave! I'm getting some insane power readings in here, and judging from the lighting, it is only running on auxiliary power! Any civilization that has the capability of producing weapons on this scale must be incredibly advanced! We have to try to see if we can salvage any technology, and analyze their power system." Tayla, who had just regained her composure, glared at the excited Canadian. "We are not going to steal from this vessel, the items don't belong to us!" spat Tayla. "Yes, yes, stealing is bad we all know that. Basic human morals and such. Look around however. Do you see anyone onboard? I sure don't, and since nobody is home, nobody is going to use this stuff, and I don't think we should let it go to waste." retorted the miffed scientist.

Sheppard, wanting to quell the argument, ended the debate. "Tayla, I understand where your coming from, but I agree with Rodney on this one for once. Its obvious this ship has been abandoned, so we might as well investigate and see what we can use." Warily looking about, he decided to split the team up to cover more ground quickly. "Ronan, your with Tayla, Rodney, you with me. Lets split up and see what we can uncover. Maintain constant radio contact, and don't get lost. This ghost ship gives me the creeps. Should anything happen, we all meet back here and radio for extraction. Now that that's out of the way, lets get moving. I don't want to be here any longer than necessary, _Rodney._" The disgruntled Colonel said with a venomous look at McKay. The man had saved their skins many times over, but always managed to get the team, himself or the mission in trouble due to his inquisitive nature. Activating the flashlight on the stock of his P90, Sheppard and Rodney began trekking through the dimly lit passages honeycombing the remains of the Forward Unto Dawn…

_**To be continued.**_

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So there is act one, giving a bit of embellished backstory and humanity to John-117, and setting the stage for the next segment of the story.

Comments/Criticisms/Suggestions are important, and are definitely welcome and encouraged. Just as a fair warning to you guys, i am considering Killing off a character or two, to add a bit of a darker, harsher reality. i am also toying with the idea of possible romantic interests as well, so i may listen to your suggestions/rants/wants/opinions on the matters.

check back relatively soon for;

_**Act Two**_

_**//(Contact))%**_


	2. Contact

Well guys, I apologize for the delay. School, work, girlfriend, friends, birthday, ect. Here is the second chapter, I hope you enjoy.

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_**Act Two**_

_**//(Contact))%**_

**UNSC Frigate Forward Unto Dawn, Starboard Corridor - **Sheppard, not for the first time in the past little while, considered bringing out the lemon he kept in his vest to shut Rodney up. The little scientist was highly allergic to citrus fruit, and when threatened with one, instantly quieted down and became noticeably less aggravating. The excited McKay was chattering on excitedly, talking in annoying scientific jargon. Sheppard pretended he was listening, adding the occasional nod and "uh-huh" of agreement, while really focusing on the portable ancient data pad that he always carried with him, that functioned as pseudo battle-radar, indicating their position, mapping the area, as well as identifying friend or foe.

Oblivious to the team leaders nervous mood, the paunchy Canadian beamed excitedly and rushed into a room unexpectedly, startling the Colonel. Not bothering to hide the annoyance from his face, the Former Special Forces soldier glared at McKay when he caught up to him. John had thought he had noticed some movement that had not originated from himself, McKay, Ronan, or Tayla, but it was too quick and fleeting to really notice. It seemed to appear on the display for a split second, then it was gone. And it seemed to be moving closer. However, when the movement did appear, it moved impossibly fast. Faster than any human could move, nor wraith for that matter. His feeling of apprehension growing with every passing moment, he tried to move the exploration along. Rodney however, was not about to be rushed, and was bent over what seemed to be a computer terminal of some sort, and he was splicing cables in an attempt to connect to the system.

McKay was feeling excited as he finished the final splices to the system he was connecting to. When he opened up the panel, he was surprised to find it very similar to the systems used on the Daedalus Class Battlecruisers. It seemed to be a composite system comprised of very advanced crystals coupled with extremely advanced microchips. From what it looked like from a simple visual examination, he estimated that the computer systems used by the Forward Unto Dawn were incredibly advanced. In fact, the disproportionate level of technology shown in the computer systems and the actual power readings that he had measured from the sensors on the Daedalus was disturbing to say the least. Granted, the multiple fusion drives he had assumed the ship carried did put out a significant amount of power, probably more than the Daedalus did without using a ZPM. The question he had was where exactly did all of that raw power go to? From what had seen from the data streaming to his tablet from the orbiting Daedalus, there were no recognizable energy shields, nor any detectable energy weapon ports. From what he had gleaned from the data provided by the 304 flying around this hulk, the only recognizable weapons were an insane amount of point defense weapons. The only thing that was not so easily recognizable was a gigantic exposed power conduit on the bottom of the ship. It looked like it powered something huge, and he guessed that was what supplied the power for their capital class weapons. From what he had seen, the conduit could easily handle all of the power if not more than what the generators could produce, which in itself was disturbing, going by the fact that no weapon systems currently on the Daedalus could even handle a fraction of that power, let alone utilize it in such a fashion.

Then there came the question of defense. The armor on this vessel was centuries ahead of the Naquadah/Trinium composite that lined the hull of the BC-304's, and there was lots of it. However, the sensor readings provided no evidence of shielding systems of any kind, which was also disturbing. In addition, they found no evidence of a hyperspace drive.

Making a few more minor splices, the smug Canadian opened his custom hacking program he used for alien systems and began to access the Dawn's database, and quickly downloaded all of the files on the damaged system. Quickly making use of his homemade decryption software, his jaw dropped at what was being displayed on the screen of his tablet. It was what looked like a point of view movie of a marine with a Sergeant's insignia on his sleeve. As the two expedition members watched the footage, they looked visibly shaken when the view of the Sergeant gazed upon the assault of the Control Room on the new halo. Seeing the battle through the soldiers eyes, they watched in horrified fascination as he hefted a huge weapon onto his shoulders, sighted in, and shot a blood red laser into a terrifying creature seemingly straight out of a zombie movie. When the scope zoomed out, the awestruck pair saw something that made the scene even more disturbing. It was a fleeting image of a gigantic green blur, rushing into a giant installation with a hoofed creature wielding what looked like a blade of cracking energy watching his back. The pair were covered in gore, and the area that they had been previously in was littered with piles of mutilated bodies of the creatures killed by the Sergeant in question.

If at all possible, Sheppard was even more shaken by the short video, and without betraying his nerves, he looked to McKay and demanded; "What the hell was that?!"

McKay, his hands visibly shaking, looked stunned, and took a moment to reply. "I dunno John, I'm attempting to figure that out." In rapid fire succession, his fingers flew over the touch screen of the tablet computer, "that was part of a recording of the last fifteen minutes of this soldiers life. It seems a live stream was being broadcast from his neural implant straight to the database of this ship. The ship's files have him listed as KIA, as well as the rest of the crew, for the exception of these three entries."

John's curiosity piqued despite his nerves, he leaned in and looked at what was being displayed on the open window of the tablet. One was what seemed like a title, one was a first name with no rank, and one was what was seemed to be a coded designation. Out of every enlisted man and woman in the ship's database, which was rather long for a frigate, the only names that were not next to a big red KIA status were Arbiter, Cortana, and Sierra-117. Seeing that list made the battle hardened warrior's blood run cold.

Clicking the button on the transmitter for his comm system, Sheppard decided to regroup, beam out and decide on the next course of action in the relative safety of the orbiting 304. "Teyla, Ronan, meet us back in the vehicle bay. I think its time to go, I have a bad feeling about this place."

"Understood. We are on our way." replied Teyla.

Noticing at the fear stricken scientist, John roughly shook him out of his reverie. "Time to go Rodney. I think we have to re-assess the situation away from, well, here."

Rodney, surprisingly mute, just nodded and followed. The man actually looked like he was about to be physically sick. Not that he blamed him. John himself had nearly lost his breakfast when he saw those disgusting creatures on the video.

**UNSC Frigate Forward Unto Dawn, Starboard Corridor - **"Well, what do you think Chief? They obviously aren't Flood or Covenant, but they obviously aren't UNSC personnel either."

The Chief was silent for a bit. He was following two men, one who seemed to be a scientist named Rodney, the other was obviously a soldier, who seemed to be called Sheppard. John wasn't too concerned with Rodney, but he was a bit wary of Sheppard. Judging by the insignia on his shoulder, he was a colonel, and the man carried himself similarly to the now deceased Johnson, in the way that he kept a look out, and his eyes always seemed to wander towards whichever spot 117 concealed himself in. The two of them seemed to be heading towards the aft vehicle bay.

"I doubt they are Insurrectionists. They didn't seem to be familiar with UNSC technology, and I don't recognize their uniforms or weapons. Though I'm sure we will find out soon enough. Unless you have another plan, I think that they are our only way off this wreck," stated the Spartan.

"Lovely, time to meet and greet. You always were _so _good at making first impressions."

Smiling to himself, the Spartan didn't even reply, just followed the two humans back to the vehicle bay, keeping a short distance between them for concealment. Although he weighed around a ton in his armor, he was surprisingly stealthy in it.

The pair he had been following had finally reached the vehicle bay, and met up with the two other members of their team. The man named John activated his comm system and said "Daedalus, this is Sheppard, requesting transport back to the ship."

Judging by the looks on the team's faces, the reply they got was less than encouraging. Deciding that more information was needed before he decided how he was going to reveal himself to the group, he thought for a moment.

"Cortana, can you hack into their comm frequencies and hear what they are saying?"

"Already on it Chief. Patching through now."

A crackle of static hissed as the suit's comm system linked with the frequency being used by the squad he was observing, and suddenly another voice was heard that didn't belong to any of the people he was watching came in loud and clear.

"… currently fixing a bug in the beam transport system, you will have to give us about ten minutes until we can extract you and your team. Caldwell out."

"Cortana, can you trace where that signal came from?" asked the Chief.

"Analyzing.. Hrm. that's interesting. It seems that I did detect a ship approaching when I thawed you. The signal is originating from a vessel smaller than the Dawn, and is currently orbiting us. My guess is that the only way out of here, is with that ship."

Silently assessing the group before him, the Chief noticed a flicker of movement on his motion tracker located on his HUD. It seemed to be originating from behind the group. With a lightning fast motion, the augmented warrior drew his pistol and activated the scope in the general direction of the movement. Looking through it, he saw a pair of gaseous infection forms creep out of the warthog he had made his harrowing escape in and rush towards the backs of the unsuspecting group.

Sighting in on the first disgusting blob, the chief fired a single round, causing the Flood form to explode with a sickening wet pop. Less than a second after the firs shot, a second rang out, and the other form followed the first into oblivion.

Hearing the shots ring out, the Atlantis team scrambled for any cover they could find, and frantically searched for the source of the reports.

"Whose there?! Hold your fire!" exclaimed a frightened McKay.

"What was that I said about first impressions?" asked Cortana dryly.

Ignoring the sarcastic AI, the Spartan chose the only option he deemed he had left if he wanted a ride out off the decimated frigate. Emerging from his hiding place in the shadowy corridor, the Chief walked into the vehicle bay, putting his sidearm back onto his magnetic plate with a metallic clink. Walking into the middle of the room, the Chief knelt to examine the remains of the Infection forms he had killed.

Behind the Scorpion the team was hiding, John fished around in his vest for his small mirror he always had. Pulling it out, he eased it around the side of the tank track, and his stomach did a literal somersault when he beheld the scene reflected in the mirror. Blinking to make sure he his eyes were not fooling themselves, he motioned for Rodney to look at what was shown. As the portly man crawled over and looked in the mirror, his jaw literally dropped.

"That's him, isn't it?" John whispered.

"That's who? Come on out from behind that Scorpion so I can see who you are." said the kneeling armored behemoth.

With that cold order, the blood in the veins of the expedition turned to ice. Thinking for a minute, Sheppard slowly began to rise to his feet, when suddenly Ronan grabbed his arm and yanked him down.

With an angry look on his face, Ronan glared at John and hissed "What the hell are you doing?! You don't even know what that thing is!"

"True, but I don't think it will kill us, at least not yet. So we might as well go introduce ourselves and see what it wants." replied the Colonel.

"How do you know it wont just simply kill us when we leave cover?!" demanded Teyla.

"Call it a hunch. Besides, if it wanted us dead, it would have killed us when it had the drop on us a few seconds ago. And in addition to that, the Daedalus needs more time to fix our way out of here. So the way I see it, having a conversation to stall for time is better than waiting here for him to come to us."

Sheppard, again attempted to rise to his feet, and was not met with any resistance this time. Rodney and Teyla rose up with him, followed by a thoroughly disgruntled looking Ronan. Gripping their respective weapons, the group nervously approached the mysterious armored soldier. Stopping a few feet away, they finally noticed the remains of the infection Forms next to the Chief.

Finally mastering his nerves, Sheppard found his voice and spoke up.

"I take it that it wasn't us you were shooting at then."

Suddenly rising to his full height, the green giant looked at the group and simply said "no."

Sheppard and his team had come across many different things over their wanderings all over the galaxy, but this giant in armor was by far one of the most intimidating. There was no visible face to see through the visor of the helmet. All you saw was a reflection of yourself on the golden polarized faceplate. McKay especially was intimidated, as he made rough estimates of the weight of such armor. He estimated it to be around 1500 pounds at least, without counting all the weapons the figure had strapped to him. Feeling knots being twisted in his stomach by the results of his assessment based on those observations, his feeling of dread increased. No human should be able to stand up straight in such an armor suit, let alone move around.

"So, who the hell are you?" grunted Ronan, breaking the prickly silence.

"Master Chief Petty Officer Spartan-117" was the short reply.

"What kind of a name is that?!" growled the muscular Satedan.

"Well, what a merry group we have stumbled upon. They just seem so friendly, don't they Chief?" said a female voice from seemingly nowhere.

Startling the Atlantis team by her sudden insertion into the conversation, the Cortana chuckled audibly. m

"Don't be alarmed, I'm actually inside the suit being worn by Mr. Social here. I am UNSC AI CTN 0452-9, but you can call me Cortana." The voice said again.

"Well, now that we are all nice and cozy with each other, do you mind telling us what you were shooting at? Its obvious that this is your ship, or what's left of it anyway, so why don't you tell us exactly what is going on here, and maybe I can arrange a ride for you off of this wreck. Unless you have some way to fix this hulk." said Sheppard.

'Well isn't he astute' thought the Chief.

'What do you think Cortana? Can we trust these people?' thought John-117, projecting it loud enough for Cortana to pick up.

'I cant say for sure. I'm not too sure on the big one, that Ronan, and the Colonel named Sheppard isn't exactly a green horn. But I don't really see what choice we have. I doubt any interstellar taxi will be rolling by anytime soon.'

'Agreed, although I don't exactly like it. Out of the fire it seems..'

'Don't complete that Chief. Just remember to keep your head down..'

'There are two of us in here after all, yeah, I remember..'

"Fine, I can provide a limited explanation, leaving out the parts that are considered classified. But I think that it should wait until we are somewhere a bit safer. I'm not sure how much longer the emergency generators will last," said the Chief.

"If you have a ship, we can talk there. When we are finished explaining ourselves, maybe we can work out a deal that will benefit us both," cut in Cortana. "However, I don't think it wise to stay here much longer, because as the Chief pointed out, we may lose power relatively soon."

"I think we can arrange something," Rodney said, starling everybody by his sudden break from silence. Activating his comm, McKay contacted the Daedalus.

"McKay to Daedalus. What is the status on the beam transporter?"

"It's back online sir. We are ready to beam you aboard at your mark."

"Roger that. Lock onto Sheppard, Teyla, Ronan, as well as the only other life sign aboard and beam them up. I need to finish up analyzing the data I am collecting. It should only take a few minutes."

"Acknowledged. Daedalus beaming in five."

Sheppard gave Rodney a startled look after that order, and opened his mouth to say something, but was cut off by the Asgard transport beam. When the light from the transporter was gone, the scientist hurriedly opened his pack, took out some latex gloves and a pair of plastic bags, and rushed to the remains of the dead infection forms. Carefully placing each specimen inside the bag and sealing it tight, he put them in his pack and shuddered at what he was doing. While he realized that these were most likely dangerous samples, the need to study them overwhelmed him, and so he decided to collect them in secret. As he shouldered his pack, he felt a pang of excitement. He knew that the "Spartan" or whatever that killing machine was would not let him touch those monstrosities, and neither would Sheppard. But he thought that he may learn something from them, however dangerous they may be.

"McKay to Daedalus. Beam me up when ready."

"I read you sir. Prep for transport."

**To Be Continued..**

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**Lol lol lol. Jerkwad cliffhangers. Gotta love em' eh? Well, I have some interesting lines for this story to go down are uncoiling in my mind right now, I'm just not sure as to which one I want to go with. So, if you guys want, post suggestions. Or comments. Or complaints. All help. All are fun to read.**

**Anyway, I'm off to bed finally. Its finals week, wish me luck!**


	3. Diplomacy

_Well guys, sorry about the insane delay, but my life has been insane lately, so it equals out in the end. No I have not abandoned the story, just have been incredibly busy. Rest assured I have not forgotten about this or you guys, so without further delay, I present act three. enjoy_

_

* * *

_

_**Act Three**_

//Diplomacy\\]

**Brig of USS Daedalus- **John-117 suddenly felt his whole body go white hot then ice cold as he rematerialized into what looked like the brig of a ship. Judging by his location, and the absence of Sheppard and his team, he guessed that they didn't quite trust him much. Not that he blamed them, he would do the same in his position. His assault rifle, grenade belt, pistol, ammo and Spartan Laser that were attached to his armor's magnetic clips were missing. The only thing left was the seemingly harmless handle of the Covenant energy sword that he had on his left magnetic thigh pad, which they probably overlooked due to its near non-existent energy signature while deactivated, and the fact that it didn't look like a typical weapon compared to most.

Looking around, he noticed a metal bench jutting from the wall, as well as a metal table rising straight up from the floor without any noticeable seams. Walking over to the seemingly open entrance, he reached out with his hand and slowly moved it towards the hallway. When his finger reached the point where the wall openings and hallway met, his shields flared and dropped to 20%, and his hand was flung back.

Grunting his annoyance, he walked back and sat down on the bench. Deciding that escape was not the way to gain favor with his supposed rescuers turned captors, he began looking over his armor systems. Many of the armor panels were melted and dented in sections from impacts, plasma hits and the odd human projectile round unleashed from flood combat forms.

Not wanting to leave anything to chance, he wanted to perform a thorough diagnostic on his entire system. 'Cortana, do me a favor and run a quick system check, I'm not sure what condition the systems are in after my little vacation on the Ark.'

'In the words of a certain Master Gunnery Sergeant, it wouldn't surprise me to find some systems are "totally fried" due to _your driving_' feeling the AI's amusement in his mind, he heard a suppressed chuckle in her reply and reference to his quip on the Pillar of Autumn.

On his HUD, a line of text rapidly scrolled down, with multiple subsystems in the redline, many in the yellow, and few in the green. Moments later, the scan was finished, and the results were displayed on his visor display, much to his displeasure. Not that the Spartan was surprised, but he didn't exactly have a way to make repairs on his suit at the moment. Taking a few moments to go over the results, he saw that the fusion pack powering his suit was down to nineteen percent, his automatic biofoam injector system was damaged, and several shield projector nodes were running below optimal efficiency.

Even without the diagnostic to hammer home the sorry shape of his armor, john could already tell that it needed some work just by looking at the outside. Most of the plasma reflective coating had been burned away, and several segments, including the chest piece, had a few hairline fractures in the titanium alloy. Luckily his comm systems, reactive metal liquid crystal layer, helmet, and visor were relatively unscathed. John's inner-armor suit, which consisted of a black titanium weave outer layer, his hydrostatic gel layer, and his moisture absorbent, temperature regulating skin suit layer were in peak condition.

Finally concluding there was not much he could to about his situation at the moment, he leaned up against the wall, one hand on the hilt of his energy sword, and decided his next move. 'Cortana, I need more information about this Sheppard and his people. Is there any way to tap into a tactical network they have?'

'I've already tapped into their comm channels, but I don't detect an actual battle network that I can access without trying to connect directly into a terminal. To make it short, there is no tactical battle network being broadcast, or they are using a frequency I cant detect, which I might add, is highly unlikely. I think in this situation, our best option is to simply sit tight, and be prepared for any eventuality. We still need a way out of deep space, so don't go using your incredibly charming Spartan social skills just yet.' suppressing a smile beneath a mask of stone, John silently agreed with her assessment, however much it went against his nature. Spartans didn't sit around, Spartans made things happen.

'fine, I will be on my best behavior.' though John, projecting as much sarcasm in the thought as he could.

'Now that's something ill have to see to believe,' Cortana quipped, feeling triumphant at her ability to get a small rise of emotion out of her friend.

**Briefing room of USS Daedalus-** Colonel Caldwell stared in slight disbelief at the data displayed on the screen next to the cell camera fixed on the statue-like armored warrior. From what the text was telling him, his "guest" he had in the brig weighed a little over half a ton, had carried enough ordinance on him to take out all of the Marines he had currently protecting his ship from being boarded without worrying about conserving ammunition.

The other troubling thing is that they couldn't get a read on the suit once they had beamed him up. After the quick scan had been completed for the transporter, they had attempted to do a complete scan of the stranger and his battle suit, but to no avail. The sensor tech described it as an "active ECM system." So in other words, they were essentially flying blind in regards to the armored individual they had in the brig currently.

Looking up at the screen again, he noticed that he still hadn't moved from his sitting position at all, and had kept that completely still pose for the better part of half an hour. Tearing his eyes away from the screen, Caldwell gazed at the team assembled before him commanded by John Sheppard and sighed in frustration. They always seemed to bring him and his ship nothing but trouble, though they had pulled him and his ship out of some tight spots as well.

Rubbing his index and middle finger in a futile attempt to ward off the splitting stress-induced migraine that frequented those in authority positions in the SGC, Caldwell finally decided to hear the report that Sheppard didn't exactly seem too eager to give. "Well, I see we have a guest aboard my ship. Care to explain Sheppard?" Caldwell growled.

Sheppard looked up, furrowed his eyebrows and leaned against the bulkhead. "Not much I can say. I really have no clue who he is, or even if he is a he. It isn't exactly talkative, but it seems to be carrying an onboard Artificial Intelligence with it. When it spoke, one voice was definitely male, while the voice claiming to be the AI was very feminine sounding. I didn't exactly want to get in a deep conversation sharing life stories on that ghost ship sir."

"Ghost ship?! Just what the hell did you mean by that Colonel?" demanded Caldwell, his eyes narrowing to small slits of suspicion. Rodney, who was busy fiddling with his tablet during the exchange, walked over to the briefing room table, and hooked the video and audio outputs to the panel controlling the big display on the wall.

"I think I can help a bit with that. When I was on the ship, I managed to splice into what was left of their mangled information network, which is incredibly advanced, disproportionately so to the level of technology we have observed so far. No small thanks to my home brew of nifty programs, I downloaded quite a bit of data from their system. Let me show you what I have managed to decrypt so far."

With a few rapid taps and a final flourish, the wall display came to life, showing the insignia of the UNSC, with the words 'UNSC Frigate Forward Unto Dawn' in a light blue shade. What caught Caldwell's attention, as well as Sheppard's, was the planet used in the background.

"Holy Shit!!" shouted John and Caldwell at the same time. Rodney, having already seen it, had a small smug smile of amusement on his face at their typical reaction. Teyla, with a confused expression, looked at McKay.

"Rodney, what is so surprising?" asked a puzzled Teyla. Before Rodney could answer, Caldwell cut him off.

"The planet in the insignia, that's earth, isn't it Rodney?" growled Caldwell. Rodney, rolled his eyes, and walked up to the table, sitting down in front of his tablet.

Looking at the rest of his team, the portly scientist let out an audible chuckle as he turned to his computer, and said "You all may want to sit down. I managed to find out quite a bit from the fragments I got to download." Seeing that everybody was seated, McKay brought up the list of personnel for the Dawn.

As the list scrolled down, an audible gasp escaped from everyone in the room except for John and Rodney, who had already seen it before. All of the thousand odd men and women listed in the ships roster, all but three had either a blood red KIA status or listed as MIA.

"My god," mumbled Caldwell. Teyla looked utterly shocked, and Ronan wasn't looking at the screen. Rodney, clearing his throat, gave them each a minute, then switched to a schematic of the Dawn, then stood up and moved over to the screen.

"As you all know, the ship was cut in half. This is a diagram of the whole ship. The part we are currently orbiting is the aft part of the ship, with the vehicle hangar, auxiliary cryo-stasis bay, aft armory, and HEV pods th-" began McKay.

"Wait, HEV pods? Which are what exactly? And what was in the vehicle hangar? Is there anything we can salvage?" cut in Caldwell. Just before Rodney was about to open his mouth to utter a sarcastic retort, Sheppard started chuckling.

"And what, exactly, is so incredibly goddamned funny Colonel?" demanded a thoroughly peeved Caldwell. John, still chuckling, pointed at the vehicle bay.

"Vehicle bay doesn't do it justice in the name department. In that 'vehicle bay' is enough armor, to storm the Cheyenne mountain complex twice over and be back in time for dinner in the mess. They have tanks, light scout vehicles, ATV's, aerial troop transports, space based fighters, and two different kinds of atmospheric aerial combat vehicles. These guys don't mess around. I don't know who they were fighting, but most of the vehicles looked like they had all seen combat. All I know is that I would not want to be on their shit list when it hit the fan." said Sheppard, finishing in a rather dark tone.

"In answer to your rather rude interruption, HEV stands for Human Entry Vehicle. Guessing by the acronym, and the location of the pods, some of these people were crazy enough to drop out of orbit and land on the ground in some insane tactical insertion." explained a miffed looking McKay. "Also, what is interesting, though it is listed as a frigate, it is _twice _the size of the Daedalus. Currently, it is beyond our capacity to build BC-304's on a mass scale, no small part due to their size. But this class of frigates there are likely over _two hundred _either destroyed or in service, judging by the number on the Dawn's IFF tag, FFG-201. And if this is a frigate, I am willing to bet that the larger ship classes are enormous. Granted, the don't have shields, despite the generator being more than sufficient to power an extremely powerful shield. However, if you look at the nose of the ship, that is actually a gigantic Magnetic Acceleration Cannon. Judging by the power it takes to fire the thing, I would guess that without a Zed-PM to power the Daedalus, it would only take one shot to take out our shields, and another could easily tear us apart. Also, from what I have gathered by the placing of the power conduits, that Cannon takes all the juice that the reactor can give it. Realize too, that this is no slipshod fission generator, this is a full on deuterium fed _cold-fusion _reactor. Which means that when we aren't using a Zed-PM for a power source, their reactor in their Frigate class puts out around 10 times the power that our naquadah reactors do. Whoever this UNSC is, they have some serious tech going on, and from what I have gathered, all of it is homegrown, which in itself is incredibly impressive."

Caldwell, looking thoroughly intrigued, asked "First of all, is any of their tech salvageable, and second, do you know if they were human?" John, rolling his eyes, got up and tapped on Rodney's tablet, showing the names of the crew again, the video of Sergeant Johnson and the camera in John's cell, and said "Judging from the names, this video, and the general shape of his armor," pointing a finger at the motionless Spartan, "I am willing to bet that they are. Though I can't even begin to guess what those things that they were fighting were, nor can I explain the gigantic hoofed alien following our guest we have currently on board shown on the video."

"Well, I think we have found out just about all we can through sifting through the data. We will mark this place down in the charts, in case we have to come back later. For now I think it best to get to Atlantis as fast as possible, then question our friend in a more secure setting. I don't like the idea of him getting upset and causing trouble on my ship," said Caldwell.

Touching the small button on the slim headset, Caldwell made contact with the bridge crew. "Caldwell to bridge, I want us headed to Atlantis at the maximum possible speed. Also, before we head into hyperspace, send a message to Doctor Weir, and inform her that we are bringing home a 'guest' and that she should make preparations to run tests, and have a backup plan should he prove to be uncooperative. Caldwell out."

Without waiting for a reply from the bridge, Caldwell looked at Sheppard's team and dismissed them. They all had a long day, and he had a feeling it wasn't about to get any easier. With any luck, he could get a few hours of shut eye before he got to Atlantis.

**4 Hours later, Atlantis Briefing Room - **Dr. Elizabeth Weir's brow drew progressively downward into a scowl during the report being given by Caldwell and Sheppard's team. She was disturbed by the presence of the derelict ship floating just outside of the galaxy, and was equally disturbed at the description of the mysterious armored soldier, though not in the same way as Caldwell, Sheppard and the rest of his team. Both she and Carson Beckett, listened, growing angry at the end of the briefing. After everything that had been said on the Daedalus had been repeated and elaborated upon, Beckett stood up and looked angrily at Sheppard and Caldwell.

"You mean to tell me that after this mystery super soldier saved your team's collective asses from these creatures that you encountered, you had the decency to throw him into the brig for the remainder of the trip, without the courtesy of a thank you, a meal or a proper medical examination? That has to be the most ridiculous thing I have heard in a long time. I cant believe that you cou-" "Where is he now?" Demanded Weir, cutting Carson's tirade off.

"I had engineering beam him down into Atlantis' holding cells." grunted Caldwell, looking annoyed at the criticism he was being subjected to.

"Well, if he wasn't hostile before, chances are he is now. People don't take too kindly to being held prisoner." with a withering glare, Elizabeth stalked off towards the transporters, motioning for Carson to follow her. The two of them hit the switch to open the transport doors, then beamed down to the holding level.

**Holding Cell, Atlantis - **John stood ramrod straight in the center of the holding cell, one hand lightly resting on the hilt of his deactivated energy sword. Despite how exhausted, thirsty, hungry and sore he was, he managed to stay completely tensed for action. He was not entirely sure if these people were friendly yet, but if they were one thing, they were cautious. That reflected well in John's opinion, but it didn't exactly make things any easier on him.

His head instantly snapped to his side when he heard a rustling sound then a woman's voice "Well, I have managed to hack their network, and I found their holographic system. It seems that these people did not build this facility, but are simply using it. From the bits I have skimmed over, the original architects of this place were just as advanced as the forerunners." said a life sized rendering of Cortana. "What, never seen a real woman before?" teased the AI.

John, feeling a bit warm in his face from the quip of his AI companion, grunted and pretended not to hear her. "Can you open this cell?" asked the Spartan.

"Typical Spartan, all work, no play, or sense of humor for that matter." pouted Cortana, Her body rippling a darker blue color. "No, it seems I cant. These Ancients, as the database calls them, were obviously well versed in AI warfare. The only way to unlock it is to physically open the door from the outside panel."

Just as two red dots appeared on his motion tracker, Cortana whispered "Someone is coming." and disappeared. Just as a man and a woman were rounding the corner, John felt a spell of lightheaded dizziness come on. 'shit. freezer burn or just fatigue, this is not the time. Tough it out Spartan..' thought John.

The man and woman both approached his cell door, and John felt another wave of dizziness hit him. His vision seemed to recede, as if looking though his eyes from a distance. The man, reaching for the panel, typed in a quick code, and the door swung open. John, not sure what he intended, moved quick as a snake, and in a motion quicker than a normal human eye could follow, grabbed the stocky man, held him to his chest, snatched the hilt of his energy sword, and squeezed the hilt. As the bluish-white blade hissed to life, he held it to the man's throat.

"Easy now there lad, don't get so carried away." gasped the shocked man. The woman, drew her side arm and pointed it at John's faceplate. "That's not helping the situation Elizabeth!" he cried, as John clutched the man tighter and brought the crackling blade up closer to his throat in a clear warning.

"Who is in command here?" demanded John, as yet another wave of disorienting dizziness struck him.

'JOHN! YOUR VITAL SIGNS THEY-'

"I am," said the Elizabeth. "Why don't we calm down, put your weapon down, lets talk about this. You aren't a prisoner, I just needed to know if you were a threat, that's why we have kept you in a cell. For our protection, and yours."

John, having trouble breathing, tried to speak, but his mouth wouldn't seem to respond to his neural commands. His vital monitor started beeping in his ears, he felt his limbs go numb and slack. As he lost his grip on the handle of the plasma sword, its automatic safety activated, and winked out of existence with a low hissing sound. Slowly, it seemed he was falling, and the floor was suddenly rushing to greet him. Before he hit the floor, he heard Cortana screaming his name in his mind, but couldn't answer. As he felt his body finally hit the ground, everything faded to a silent black.

**Unknown Ship, Location Unknown - **Suddenly a blinding light seared into the blackness of sleep. Feeling the coldness of Cryo, a voice sounded over the comm, "Captain, wake up. Something has happened."

_**To be continued..**_

_Well, I decided on what path my story will ultimately take, and decided I may need a bit more firepower than I previously intended. Stay tuned._

"_If wishes were fishes, we'd all cast nets"_

_-Gurney Halleck_


	4. Reunion

_**/Reunion(\**_

**Unknown Ship, Unknown Location - **Suddenly a blinding light seared into the blackness of sleep. Feeling the coldness of Cryo, a voice sounded over the comm, "Captain, wake up. Something has happened." The man addressed as Captain slowly crawled out of the Cryo pod, and reached for the robes stored next to the pod. As he dressed himself, he slowly became aware of what was going on. Suddenly, a flare of light exploded on a pad next to him, forming into an image of a rather attractive woman with long hair and flowing white robes. "Captain, we have a bit of a problem. Get dressed and come to the Observation Bay, Professor Anders is already there. There is something you need to see." With a faint hiss, the hologram faded from existence, leaving Captain James Cutter to gather his uniform and dress in peace. When he finished, he took in a deep breath, filling his lungs with the smell of recycled air, listening to the familiar sounds of life within his ship, the Spirit of Fire. Exhaling, he strode off towards the Observation Deck, where Professor Ellen Anders had set up her lab.

**Observation Deck, Spirit of Fire - **As Cutter walked into Anders' "lab" he was rather shocked, not at the sight of Anders being there, but what she was wearing. Gone was the lab coat, jeans and nylon over suit top. Instead, she was wearing what seemed to be an extremely form fitting matte-black body suit, with combat boots, a black holster strapped to her leg holding her magnum side arm. In addition, she had what looked to be custom fitted composite plate armor greaves, shin plates, a breastplate, and a single pauldron on her right shoulder, on which a single ace of spades card was strapped. All which seemed to naturally fit to the suit, and to her body. Guessing that the outfit was a custom side project of hers, he assumed that she had been out of cryo for quite some time. Their many narrow escapes seemed to have changed her more than he had first assumed when he put her to sleep. But that was a thing war tended to do.

Shaking his head in resignation, Cutter walked up to Anders, noticing the three members of the Spartan Red Team staring out into the void. All three of them had an Ace of spades painted on their right pauldrons of their MJOLNIR armor as well. Such a minor detail was a major thing for the incredibly detached, reserved Spartans. It signified how much respect they had gained for the deceased Sgt. Forge. He was not too surprised to see them out of cryo as well. Suddenly he heard a hiss, and a flash of light appeared on the tabletop in the middle of the room, which coalesced into the form of the ship's AI Serina.

"Well, now that you are awake Captain, you can guide us valiantly into the jaws of oblivion," griped a rather miffed looking Serina. Anders, looking up from her calculations, gave her a frosty glare. The three Spartans, hearing Cutter's rank, immediately snapped to attention and saluted.

"Serina, get out of my lab." growled Anders, evidently not in a very tolerant mood. As the AI disappeared, She turned and started to gaze out of the windows of the observation bay. Captain Cutter walked over and gazed out there with her in silence for a time. Putting his hand on her shoulder he finally managed to find his voice.

"What is it that I need to see?" he asked softly.

"Captain, we have been adrift for roughly two hundred years. Our power reserves are at forty percent, and we are no where near UNSC controlled space. Roughly a month ago, I was woken up by a subroutine I had programmed into the sensors. Only three things would have triggered that. Either detection of a Covenant Ship, Detection of a UNSC vessel, or an unauthorized change in trajectory. It was the third one." explained Anders. She had a rather rough rasp to her voice, almost as if she had been crying recently.

"So which one was it?" asked Cutter.

"The third," replied Anders. "That is why I have woken up all of the ship's crew about a week ago. We seem to be drifting straight into a wormhole. I have had all the personnel prep the ship as best as we can. I just need you to activate certain systems. I have tried all I can, but the gravity field has us in its grip. We should be thankful this anomaly is a wormhole rather than a black hole. We have a slight chance of survival, but I have no idea as to what is on the other side. Theoretically, it could fling us into the past, the future, further into the universe, or into an alternate universe altogether. I'm sorry I didn't wake you earlier, but I miscalculated on how long it would take us to reach the event horizon. We started accelerating exponentially about an hour ago, and that cut down the time from a few days to a few hours. We will reach the center of the anomaly in roughly twenty minutes, give or take."

Cutter, shocked as he was, realized that there really was nothing Anders could do. Still staring out the window, he put on his mask of the fearless leader. "What do you need me to do?" he asked.

"Put the military forces on alert, prime the Archer missile pods, and initiate a Mac charge, prep the Longswords for a quick scramble, fuel up the pelicans and prep a few HEV pods. There is no way of telling what is on the other side waiting for us, if we do survive." Anders said, the last words little more than a whisper.

"I understand. Lets go up to the bridge. Serina?" Cutter said. The AI flashed back into existence.

"Yes Captain?" asked the sarcastic hologram.

"Prep the ship and all forces, and move us up to combat alert status one. I want it done in five minutes."

"Understood Captain. Prepping the Spirit of Fire and all her forces to fight phantom forces beyond the wormhole." and with a hiss, she disappeared.

Taking one last look out the window, Cutter made his way to the bridge, Professor Anders and the three Spartans following close behind.

**Bridge, Spirit of Fire - **Captain Cutter stood from his command chair and faced the three Spartans and Anders. The time spent with the four of them had changed him, and for some reason, he felt a sort of fatherly feeling towards them, as he had with Forge. With a feeling of pride, he addressed them all. "Look, whether we make it out to the other end of this wormhole, if it is indeed such a thing, no matter what, I want you to know that I am proud of you, and it has been an honor to serve with you." With that, he saluted them. When the Spartans returned the salute, and Anders looked away in a rare display of humility, Cutter returned to his command chair.

Suddenly Serina winked into existence on a pad in the center of the bridge. "You may want to sit down, we will be reaching the anomaly's event horizon in Five, Four, Three, Two, On-"

Suddenly the bridge was lit by the light of a million suns, and time seemed to stop. There was feeling of nothing, then just as suddenly, the light disappeared. "One, Mark." finished Serina. As Cutter, Anders, and the Spartans opened their eyes, they were shocked to see a planet in the viewport. "Serina, perform a scan, find out where we are, and what is on that planet, as well as set an orbit for us."

"Understood, orbit calculations complete, trajectory alterations achieved.. Scanning.. Two UNSC signals detected on a floating city in the middle of the planets main ocean! According to the IFF tags, the two signals belong to a UNSC ship board AI known as Cortana, and, well, you wont believe this until you see it for yourself." With a lazy wave of her hand, Serina brought up the IFF tags of both signals. The second one created a visible stir among the Spartans. It read Sierra-117..

"John.." whispered one of the Spartans. Suddenly, the status light next to the tag labeled Sierra-117 went from green to yellow briefly, then went red. When the light hit red, the Spartans when ramrod straight, as if they had been struck by lightning. "Sir! Requesting permission for a hot drop down to the city!"

Cutter, who knew what that little light signified, and the extreme kinship felt between the Spartans, did not hesitate. "Permission granted! Take the prepped HEV pods, and rescue that Spartan! I will have two squads of ODST ready to drop at your signal for support when you locate him. Serina! Alter the trajectory, take us right over the floating city. I want you to drop the pods as close to the center spire of the city as you can. Spartans! Get to your pods, and prepare to drop in five. Good luck, and Godspeed!"

As the Spartans turned and rushed for the door, Anders took off to her lab to analyze the data being continuously streamed by the sensors. Cutter, not wanting to take any precautions, grabbed the microphone. Suddenly, speakers all over the ship came alive with his voice. "All hands to battle stations! This is not a Drill! All hands, battle stations!" Suddenly, the Spirit of Fire was a rush of activity, as each man and woman on that ship new what that meant, none of the roughly eleven thousand people crewing the ship were green in the least.

**Meanwhile, Atlantis Control Room - **Rodney looked up from his laptop screen when he heard the ancient proximity alarm tone with an utterly shocked expression. As he looked at the data, his shock turned to disbelief, then fear. Doublechecking to see that what he thought was the trajectory and specs on the ship was correct, he quickly hit the button on his earpiece. "Sheppard, Caldwell, Weir! We just detected an unknown warship in orbit around the planet! It has altered it's trajectory to bring itself over the top of us in less than five minutes, and I am detecting a massive charge of energy within it! If what I am reading is correct, this thing is huge, roughly two and a half kilometers long, and I am detecting upwards of ten thousand life signs aboard!"

The earpiece squawked in McKay's ear as Sheppard and Caldwell acknowledged his frenzied report. "Understood, the Daedalus will scramble to intercept. ETA to launch six minutes. I suggest putting the marines on alert." replied Caldwell.

"Way to be looking out Rodney. I hear ya', I guess its time to roll out the welcome mat." drawled Sheppard in his rather nonchalant way of speaking.

"The ship itself has made no overtly hostile moves as of yet, and, wait, I just received a signal, it's IFF tag, it is a UNSC vessel! It is registered as the Phoenix Class Spirit of Fire! I don't think they may be too happy to find our big green friend down in a cell." squeaked Rodney, a rather panicked tone taking hold of his voice.

"Caldwell here, it's a bit late for that. The Sensor operator on the Daedalus just picked up several deep scan waves. They know we are here, and most likely know that we have the Spartan as well. I would not be surprised if they attempted to mount some sort of a rescue mission."

'Great, this is going from bad to worse' thought McKay. As he watched the sensors, he noticed as the big ship passed overhead in orbit, three small pieces seemed to break off from the bottom of the ship. As he calculated their trajectory, his heart started hammering in alarm. Jamming his finger to the button on the radio on his ear, McKay managed to stutter out; "Incoming unknown metal objects, They will impact just outside of the control center in less than thirty seconds! Brace for impact!"

**Holding Cell, Atlantis - **With a resounding crash, Weir watched as the seven foot armored behemoth seemed to go unconscious, releasing his iron grip on the sword of energy and Carson at the same time. Rushing over to Beckett, she helped him to his feet. Looking him over, she saw that other than a possible bruise on his neck, he should be fine. Nevertheless, she still asked him, "Are you ok?"

"Oh, I'm just fine dear, I love nothing more than being held hostage via a very hot sword of energy and an iron chokehold. But putting that aside, we need to provide medical attention. He doesn't seem to strike me as the type to simply pass out in the middle of an unknown or possibly hostile situation. Given the treatment he has been subjected to by us and our compatriots, I am not surprised in the least by his reaction."

Suddenly the earpieces on both squawked to life with the panicked reports of the McKay and Caldwell. Weir, suddenly getting the feeling that they had stepped on a landmine, shook her head, and tried to ignore the knot of worry that was twisting her guts.

"It seems we haven't exactly given the best first impression to the UNSC Carson," said Elizabeth.

"I believe you are correct Doctor. In the meantime, the best we can do is try to find out the status of our armored friend here," grumbled Beckett. As he started to kneel down beside the Spartan, a sudden hiss, then a flare of light erupted over the prone form of the Spartan, coalescing into a life sized form of a woman. A very angry looking, blue hued woman, with lines of data swirling up and down here skin tight jumpsuit. Carson and Beckett, with shocked expressions, stumbled back a few steps.

"DON'T YOU DARE TOUCH HIM!" exclaimed the furious avatar, as a flash of red pulsed in her eyes.

Weir, wanting to defuse the situation with this mysterious woman that seemed to appear from nowhere, lowered her side arm to her side, and spoke in a calm, controlled tone; "Its ok, we are only trying to help. We mean no harm, and have no hostile intentions towards you or that Spartan there."

"So that's why you threw us into the brig of you ship, and a holding cell down here, because you have nothing but friendship and goodwill to offer? Somehow I fail to see the logic in that." said Cortana rather angrily.

"Look, I apologize for the rather brusque treatment you have been subjected to, and I assure you, it is not anything I had sanctioned. I am Dr. Elizabeth Weir, and I am in charge of this facility. Who, and what, are you if you don't mind me asking?" replied Weir in a placating tone.

"I am Cortana, a Smart AI created by the UNSC. And this man beneath me is Sierra-117." snapped Cortana, looking very nervous despite the tone of anger being displayed.

Carson, looking very intently at the immobile form of the Spartan beneath the incensed AI, finally snapped at the enraged Cortana. "Look lass, I know that you are concerned, but this man obviously needs medical attention! I won't allow any harm to befall him, so please, stand aside so I can examine him."

Before any of them could say anything else, three gigantic impacts were felt, shaking the floor. Just as Dr. Weir was about to demand a status report, the radio came to life. "This is SGA 2. We have visual confirmation of landing pods outside the control tower. Three pods on total, with one unidentified contact each exiting them. HOLY SHIT! The three contacts just rushed the control tower entrance! MY GOD, WHAT ARE THEY? CONTACTS SEEM TO BE MOVING AT SPEEDS UPWARDS OF 50 KILOMETERS PER HOUR! RECOMMEND TAGGING THEM AS HOSTILES! THEY SEEM TO BE MAKING THEIR WAY TO THE HOLDING CELLS! ALL UNITS, ATTEMPT TO INTERCEPT! GET TO THE HOLDING CELLS!"

Cortana, suddenly perked up. She was detecting three signals, closing fast, that shouldn't exist. Suddenly, she was reading the IFF tags of Jerome-092, Alice-130, and Douglas-042. Those Spartans were supposedly some of the few that were legitimately listed MIA. They were stationed on the Spirit of Fire, and were listed MIA along with the entire crew of the ship. If they were here, that meant that there was a possibility, however remote, that the Spirit was too.

Before either Weir or Beckett could respond to that news, there was a gigantic crash from behind the door to the holding cells, then another. Finally, a resounding explosion blasted the door out into the room, and three armored giants rushed in. In a blur, the soldiers rushed over to where John was. One settled over the downed Spartan in an evident protective stance, wielding two sub machine guns, each pointed at Weir and Beckett as the other two both searched and disarmed each. Once satisfied the location was relatively secure, the Spartan with a red stripe on his helmet and breastplate looked at Cortana, then at John at her feet. "What is his status Cortana?" he inquired, evidently reading the IFF broadcast.

"Not good Spartan. His life support system locked down his suit into critical support mode. He has been through a lot, and only recently came out of cryo. A combination of freezer burn, and who knows how many internal injuries may have accumulated over our escape from the Flood." replied Cortana.

"Understood ma'am. Spirit of Fire, this is Red Leader. Requesting extraction and MEDEVAC ASAP."

**Bridge, Spirit of Fire - **Captain Cutter strapped himself into his command chair as the unknown vessel came up from the base and sped towards his ship. From the speed of approach, and the fact that they had possibly taken a Spartan hostage, he decided to deem it hostile. "Red Team, we have a bit of a situation here. Hold your position, and wait for extraction." said Cutter, responding to the transmission from the Spartan team on the ground.

"Serina, initiate burn, and calculate a trajectory that will keep us in orbit over their ocean fortress. Charge up the MAC cannon, and when we are in orbit, scramble and launch all six Longsword squadrons. Prime all archer missile pods, and monitor the enemy ship that just established orbit. Any sign of aggression, open up with an Archer salvo once we are over their base. Hopefully that will give us some cover from any heavy weapons they may possess."

"Acknowledged Captain, prepping for combat, and initiating burn. You do realize that a good portion of our port side armor has been sheared off due to that contact with the covenant destroyer right.?"

"I realize that Serina. Do it anyway."

**Bridge, USS Daedalus - Looking up from his instruments, the comm officer turned to Colonel Caldwell. "Sir, the enemy ship is changing trajectory. It looks like it will establish a stationary Orbit over Atlantis in less then five minutes. I also cannot get a lock on any targets inside the ship, due to some sort of ECM interference. Beaming anybody in or out is not an option. Besides, from the size of that behemoth, I doubt we have enough manpower in the entire Pegasus galaxy to storm it."**

**Caldwell ran his hand over his balding head, and debated on what action to take. The commander of this unknown ship was no fool, he established orbit over Atlantis on the off chance that they had high yield weapons to bring to bear. Smart of him to assume so, because they did in fact have high megaton nuclear fusion warheads, but without a ZPM to power the base shield, he couldn't use one, even in space, directly over the city. "Raise the shield, and prepare the Railguns. Launch the F-302 squadron, and prepare for combat, we engage them when we catch up to them over Atlantis. Be careful where you shoot, we don't want any rounds damaging the city. We want to disable the ship over destroying it, so target their engines and weapon systems."**

"**Acknowledged Sir. Coming into firing range in three, two, one.."**

**TO BE CONTINUED.**

**Sorry all for the dickish absence period, graduation, and just general life sucks to deal with at times. I am back and working on my writing again, so, hopefully I can devote more time to this series. No, I have not abandoned it, I just don't have the time I wish for it.**


	5. Decision

**/**Decision/

**Bridge, Spirit of Fire **- "Captain, the unknown vessel has changed its course. It seems to be heading on an intercept trajectory, straight for us. I guess they weren't too happy with our little Spartan field trip down there. I am also detecting the launch of a squadron of fighter craft, as well as a shielding system powering up. Based on the rough analysis of Covenant shielding systems as to what I am seeing here, one, maybe two MAC rounds will be needed to completely disable it. I have four shots primed in the MAC cannon now, which is more than enough to destroy the vessel, if need be." said Serina, projecting the data on the tactical hologram table. "Might I suggest that we make this simple, take down their shielding systems, then hail the ship and it's base? I know that the Spartans down there are surely not the best candidates for… delicate introductions." Stroking the fine gray stubble yet to be shaved from his chin, Cutter nodded his head. "Acknowledged Serina. Target the enemy ship, and launch all six Longsword squadrons. Have them form a defensive screen around the Spirit. Once that is completed, bring the shields down on the enemy vessel, then hail both the fortress below and the aforementioned ship on an open frequency." Serina, with a bored expression, disappeared from view with a hiss after a lazy nod of acceptance. Cutter stared down at the tactical display, wondering who, or what exactly were these enemies.

**Bridge, USS Daedalus - **Caldwell looked at the tactical overview screen with a feeling of dread. Not only was the ship they were going to engage bigger than they were, it was also tough. The scanner readouts analyzed the makeup of the big dreadnought, and the results were not at all comforting. The behemoth had 22 massive deck guns, most likely rail guns of some sort, as well as five meters of armor plating, consisting of an unknown Titanium based alloy. The only weakness Caldwell could detect was a massive rent in the side of the ship, seemingly from a collision of some sort. Assuming they could get around to the weak side, they could possibly use the rail guns and F-302 fighters to disable the ship. Suddenly, the tactical overlay flashed again. "Sir, reading the launch of six squadrons of fighter sized vessels, however, they are not of any variant we have recorded in the database. They seem to be forming a defensive perimeter around the ship." The Colonel sat down, and strapped himself into the command chair. "Bring us to bear, full burn, and establish an orbit around the Spirit of Fire just in range of our rail guns. We will use our speed and size to our advantage. Have the F-302 squa-"

Suddenly, a flash of light brighter than the sun erupted through the viewports of the Daedalus, along with a bone jarring explosion. Sirens began blaring all throughout the deep space carrier, and the emergency lights came on just as the main ones failed. "What the hell was that?" roared a dazed Caldwell, as he attempted to get his bearings. "Si-Sir, a 600 ton kinetic round just hit us at around 30 kilometers per second. The massive amount of energy completely discharged the shield systems, and fried most of the power grid. We have secondary propulsion, but our shield and engine conduit coils are fried. We are lucky it was a glancing shot off the shields, or we would have severe hull damage. Until we can get the main engines back online, we aren't going anywhere fast." Caldwell banged his fist against the arm of the command chair in frustration. Whoever these UNSC were, they weren't foes to be trifled with. Now that the Daedalus was out of commission, the entire Pegasus expedition was at the mercy of this UNSC. "Have the F-302's form a defensive screen around us, and put us into a stable orbit. All we can do now is wait to see what their next move is."

**Holding Cell, Atlantis - **Elizibeth and Carson were both shocked to see three more of the armored commandos suddenly appearing. They moved with practiced efficiency, speed, and precision that no human was capable of. Weir stepped forward, in an attempt to greet the giant with the red strip on his helmet. In an instant, faster than her eyes could register, she was greeted by a submachine gun barrel pressed to her forehead. "Ma'am, step back. I won't warn you again. My orders are to extract this Spartan, and to avoid unnecessary casualties if at all possible. However, as it seems you were holding him prisoner, I am less inclined to follow that particular clause." Lowering his gun, the giant motioned towards the wall. "Both of you, back against there. No sudden movements now." Carson, backing away slowly, decided to speak first for the two. "Now, look here lad, we aren't trying to hurt him. He needs medical attention. I am a doctor, and I have the facilities here to treat this man. Yes, we did lock him up, but not to keep him prisoner, but to keep ourselves safe until we could figure out who or what he was."

Suddenly, there was a flurry of activity near the entrance of the cell area, and Ronan, Tayla, Sheppard, and three marines burst through the door, their guns trained on the three Spartans. An instant later, two of the Spartans reacted, looking like blurs as they did so. Two bounds, and Alice-130 was in front of the three marines, and within a span of four seconds, completely disarmed each, throwing all three against the wall in rapid succession. Simultaneously, Jerome-092 was in front of Sheppard, Tayla, and Ronan. Ronan, expecting a sudden rush, managed to get a shot off with his blaster before he too was disarmed and thrown against the wall with everybody else. To the shock of all present save UNSC personnel, the energy dissipated with a orangish glare just centimeters away from the eye shield of the armored giant.

"Ok, so now we know we have thoroughly pissed somebody off. Lets just all calm down, and start over." grunted a dazed Sheppard from the wall, as he struggled to his feet. "I am Colonel John Sheppard of the Atlantis Expedition. I lead the military force here on Atlantis. Why don't we stop shooting, and talk?" Suddenly, light flared right in front of him, coalescing into the life sized form of Cortana. "That, I think is an excellent idea Colonel. Tell your forces to stand down, and I will do the same for these Spartans here. Unless, of course, you think one man with a machete can take all three of them down single-handedly." she said, pointedly grinning at Ronan, who had gotten up with a hand on his blade strapped to his back. Sheppard, rolling his eyes, made a pointed gesture at Ronan to put his blade away, and folded his arms. But before any body else could speak, a transmission came blaring over the open channels. "Attention unknown forces, cease and desist all hostilities. This is the UNSC AI Serina of the Phoenix Class Spirit of Fire. We have you outgunned, and outmanned, further aggression will only result in your demise. Now, if you please, lets have some civilized discourse. Your base has been targeted with several thermonuclear warheads, as well as your lovely frigate that has been so aggressive. Now, all we want is the safe return of the Spartan you have in captivity, and then we will unlock your vessel and base. Do you acknowledge? We will not fire upon you unless provoked, but we do not tolerate having UNSC personnel taken hostage or prisoner. Comply with the return of the Spartan, and Spartan team, and further dialogue will be established."

Elizibeth, looking pointedly at Cortana, keyed into her headset. "This is Dr. Elizibeth Weir, commander of the Atlantis Expedition. I acknowledge your request, and will comply. However, the Spartan in question is in no shape to be transported very far. We have a full medical facility here on the base, as well as a team of medical staff. My forces will stand down, but he needs to be treated immediately."

**Bridge, Spirit of Fire **- Serina looked at Cutter, who was staring down at the tactical readout still. The Captain was debating on whether or not to trust the woman that had just responded to Serina's hail. However, he had the upper hand tactically, and doubted that the Atlantis Expedition would be stupid enough to provoke a response by harming the Spartans, assuming they even could. He heard the bulkhead door open, and knew who it was without even looking. "What is it Anders?" The petite scientist, clad in her new outfit, glared at Serina before speaking. "Sir, I suggest that you allow me to go down to the citadel with a detachment of ODST and a few of our own medics. I saw the readout on John-117, he can't be moved as much as possible. Also, I saw that the Expedition forces are Humans, as far as I can tell. I can't tell where we are, none of the constellations used for navigation are here in this space. Like it or not, we are stuck orbiting this planet, with these people below us. We need their help if we are to get back home as soon as possible."

Cutter rose from his chair, and strode over to the viewport, looking out at the crippled Atlantean ship and the planet below. "Permission granted. Just be careful, and don't let your guard down. We didn't exactly have the best first impressions when we first met, the Atlanteans and us." Rolling her eyes, Serina chuckled. "Oh, I wonder why that is." Looking at Serina, Cutter walked toward his command chair, and sat with a tired sigh. "Get the pelicans loaded, and on their way as soon as you can. Have two squadrons of Longswords escort them. Also, engage the repair drones, and have them work on the side of the ship. Might as well take advantage of the lull in combat while we can." Serina, walking across the holographic display, nodded her head. "Roger that Captain, lets just hope that the ODST saying, "feet first into hell", doesn't apply to the upcoming diplomatic negotiations."

Ignoring the AI, Cutter keyed into his intercom; "Attention Atlantis Expedition, this is Captain James Cutter of the UNSC Spirit of Fire. I recognize the situation below, and I agree that medical treatment needs to be done ASAP. Therefore, I am transporting a team of my own medics, as well as our Science officer, and an escort down to your base. My Spartans will stand down, but only they will be the ones transporting the downed Spartan to your medical facilities. Once there, both my medical staff and yours will attend to the Spartan, who is designated 117, under the watch of his comrades, as well as the Detatchment of Orbital Drop Shock Troops I have sent as an escort. You may also have some guards, but any aggression will be dealt with swiftly. After treatment has been administered, and the Spartan stabilized, I will then meet the leaders of your expedition in person. For now, my Science Officer, Dr. Anders, will be the representative for our respective faction. Dr. Weir, do you agree to these terms?"

There was a hiss of static, then Weir responded, sounding thoroughly exasperated; "Yes, we agree. We will begin prepping the medical wing, while your Spartans transport 117 to the medical bay. We will broadcast a beacon for transport to land, and I will meet Dr. Anders at the landing area and show her to the Medical wing personally. Thank you Captain."

**Holding Cell, Atlantis - **Dr. Carson Beckett, glad that the hostilities had ended, for now, stepped up to the Spartan team. "Alright lads, lets get him up to the med wing. I will lead you to it, and only me, so there is no need to worry." Pointing to the exit, Carson walked out, Followed by Jerome, Alice, and Douglas, who were carrying John between them. As they left, Weir looked at Sheppard and his team. "Alright, we are going to go and meet this Dr. Anders and her team out on the landing pad. Lets have Rodney head towards the landing pad, and move it out there. I want nobody making any sudden or aggressive moves. These are obviously not people to be trifled with, and are a faction we have never encountered before. Hopefully we can salvage this encounter, and possibly gain a powerful new ally in our fight with the Wraith. Whoever these UNSC people are, they have some very solid tech, as well as incredibly disciplined soldiers." Keying her headset, she gave McKay his orders, and motioned for Sheppard and his team to follow her out.

**Landing Area 1, Atlantis - **Weir, Sheppard, Rodney, Tayla, and Ronan watched with growing apprehension as they saw the three big transports approaching. Sheppard and Rodney in particular were impressed, as they were obviously tech that was homegrown to the UNSC, and was superior to anything that Earth had come up with on its own similar to its function. Suddenly, just before the transports landed, several interceptor craft flew low overhead, obviously the escort for the transports. Sheppard chuckled as Rodney ducked to the ground. Hotshot fighter pilots were all the same wherever you are from.

When the first Pelican landed, it immediately dropped the back of it, and six ODST troopers rushed out, taking defensive stances, as Dr. Anders disembarked. The two others landed as well, unloading the medics, as well as twelve other ODST's onto the deck of the floating citadel. Anders, seeing the small group waiting for them, was in awe of the size of the place. When she came down in the pelican, she noticed that this wasn't just a fortress, it was an entire city. And, to top it all off, it seemed strange that only a small number of life signs inhabited such a vast place. Her hypothesis was that they were not the original occupants, but such thought would have to wait. Striding toward Weir and her group, she stopped in front of the five, her six ODST guards not far behind. "Where is the Spartan? Introductions can wait, he needs medical attention." Weir, not wanting to keep her waiting, started towards the Med Bay, "Dr. Anders I presume? Follow me, I will take you to him." she called out over her shoulder. Anders made a motion for the medical staff and the rest of the ODST to follow, only leaving a few behind to guard the pelicans. As she walked, she checked to see that her sidearm was loaded and ready to go. Just a precaution, but she wasn't taking any more chances. Not after the shield word. With a bit of apprehension, she followed the Atlanteans inside.

**To Be Continued**


	6. Forward Unto an Update

Here is the deal. I am active duty army, and I wrote this story in highschool before I joined. I now have a bit of extra time on my hands, so I am trying to regain my interest in writing again. Now, I cannot make any solid promises as to if/when I update, but I wanted you all to know that I am still interested in this story, and would like to continue. However, I have many personal issues I am dealing with at the present time, which I am sure you all can understand. I do want to take the time to thank you all, each one of you, for the mostly positive reviews, comments, and support. Reading them all, yes all, has helped me quite a bit in multiple ways. I also want to thank everyone who took the time to pm me, even though I am just now, starting to reply to them. So in conclusion, if all goes well, the story shall continue.

V/R

-Lucy


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